Doaa El-Bey , Thursday 4 Jan 2018

“It was a totally unexpected step,” commented Diaaeddin Al-Kousi, an expert on water issues and former adviser to the minister of water resources and irrigation, in reaction to news that Egypt wants the World Bank to give technical advice on the building of the controversial Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD).

In a meeting with his Ethiopian counterpart Workneh Gebeyehu in Addis Ababa last week, Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukri proposed the involvement of the World Bank as an impartial third party in meetings of the technical committee studying the effects of the construction of the dam on downstream countries.

The one-day meeting between Shoukri and Gebeyehu aimed to break the impasse regarding the work of the tripartite technical committee made up of representatives of Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan.

Ethiopia is attempting to prolong negotiations on technical matters in order to sidestep a report stating that the dam will harm downstream countries until after the completion of the dam’s construction, Al-Kousi added.

Involving the World Bank has several advantages, as it was the party that initiated the Nile Basin Initiative (NBI) in 1999 on the management of the River Nile’s water and thus has ample experience in this regard.

The NBI was a partnership initiated by the Nile Basin countries as a platform for dialogue and joint work on sharing the river’s resources, promoting peace and stability in the region.

According to the international laws governing international rivers, differences between countries should be settled via direct negotiations between the involved parties followed by involving a third party or more. If the mediation fails, the issue can be referred to international organisations like the United Nations.

Al-Kousi added that the bank has experts who have long experience in mediation issues. “I cannot describe it as 100 per cent unbiased, but they have the skills and the ability to read, understand and analyse the issues,” he said.

Mohamed Hegazi, former assistant to Egypt’s foreign minister, agreed. “During the difficult technical and political negotiations, World Bank experts assisted the involved countries in solving various legal hurdles and proposing the proper legal solutions to many problems that came up in the negotiations,” he said.

Hegazi pointed to the role played by the World Bank in the difficult negotiations between India and Pakistan which had led to the historic signing of the Indus Water Treaty in 1960.

This was signed after nine years of negotiations between India and Pakistan with the help of the World Bank, which is also a signatory to it. It lasted until December 2016, when India wanted to build various hydroelectric projects on the river, to which Islamabad raised objections.

The competition for water in the Indus River Basin has noticeably increased since the treaty was signed, necessitating the need for renegotiation of it. Delegations from India and Pakistan met at the World Bank headquarters in Washington in September last year for a round of talks on the issue.

After they had failed to agree, Pakistan requested the World Bank to fulfil its obligations by establishing a court of arbitration to settle the dispute in the light of the Indus Water Treaty.

Based on the success of previous third-party mediation in water-sharing issues, Egypt then suggested to Ethiopia last week that the World Bank be included in the River Nile negotiations.

“The failure of the technical committee to agree on the preliminary report submitted by the consultancy firms will impede the continuation of the studies on the impacts of the dam on Egypt and Sudan,” Shoukri told his counterpart in Ethiopia.

According to the Declaration of Principles signed in March 2015, the studies should be conducted before the dam filling process starts.

Assuring his country’s commitment to the Declaration of Principles and its determination not to cause harm to Egypt, Gebeyehu promised to study the Egyptian initiative and respond at the earliest opportunity.

Shoukri stated that he would submit the same initiative to Sudan within the next few days. The World Bank has not reacted to the Egyptian initiative, and no one was available to comment on the issue.

Negotiations between the three countries on the GERD broke down last November after the 17th round of technical talks was held in Cairo and attended by the irrigation ministers of the three countries.

After the meeting, Minister of Irrigation Mohamed Abdel-Ati declared that the technical track was facing deadlock. Egypt approved the preliminary report, but Ethiopia and Sudan demanded major amendments to the proposed studies. They failed to reach a compromise.

“It is strange that Ethiopia did not accept the preliminary report,” Al-Kousi said. “It is even stranger that Sudan did not either, although it signed an agreement with Egypt stating that both states should follow the same policies regarding Nile water issues,” he added.

The draft preliminary report was produced by a French consultancy firm in March last year. It includes studies to be conducted by the firm on the hydrological, hydraulic, environmental and economic impact of the dam.

During last week’s visit to Addis Ababa, Shoukri also met with Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn to discuss the upcoming visit by Desalegn to Cairo later this month in addition to bilateral relations and the challenges facing the technical track on the dam.

The involvement of the World Bank, Hegazi added, would be likely to provide a catalyst for establishing a framework for regional cooperation in which a multi-purpose project integrating water, power grids, railway and road network between the three countries could be drawn up.

“International financial institutions like the World Bank and other donors will certainly favour supporting a multi-dimensional project that involves many countries, in which water is just one factor in a multi-faceted cooperation programme,” he said.

The construction of the GERD has been a source of tension between Ethiopia and Egypt for some years. The dam, begun in 2011, is due for completion in the middle of this year. It will hold a massive 79 billion cubic metres of water and will be the largest hydroelectric power plant in Africa.

Ethiopia argues that there will be no reduction of water downstream, as all the Blue Nile water will be cycled through the dam and eventually reach the downstream countries on its way to the Mediterranean. It also claims that more water will be available overall because there will be less evaporation.

*This story was first published in Al-Ahram Weekly

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Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, concerned US politicians like Rep. Chris Smith, Rep. Mike Coffman, Ethiopian activists and others who care about human rights in Ethiopia have been exposing tortures, killings and massacres committed by the TPLF regime for more than twenty-five years. Most of these crimes are still being committed against many Ethiopians for their political views and ethnicities. Former prisoners, like Habtamu Ayalew, who were lucky enough to survive, have told us of unimaginable human suffering in TPLF prisons. A brave girl named Nigist Yirga and other have told us they are being tortured because of what ethnic group they are a part of.

TPLF cadres have defecated and urinated on Ethiopians in captivity, making the TPLF regime one of the worst human rights violators in history. Unfortunately, there were so many Ethiopians who never survived the inhumane torture practices of the TPLF at Maekelawi, Kilinto and other places including secret prisons in Tigray. If Maekelawi is to be converted to a museum, it should certainly include the stories and pictures of thousands of Ethiopians who were tortured and killed by the TPLF regime. The museum should certainly have to play a recorded interview of Habtamu Ayalew and others who are survivors of TPLF savagery.

The puppet prime minister has put all the blame regarding Maekelawi on the Derg Regime.  While the Derg has done a lot of despicable crimes on Ethiopians it is also a fact that Hailemariam Desalegn and Meles Zenawi took torture to the highest level of inhumanity. Listening to the prime minister’s denial of his regime’s crimes, it seems fair to ask if the religious, caring and family loving Hailemariam Desalegn could have survived the following done to him by TPLF cadres every day for months.

1. Defecating and urinating on him
2. Extracting his nails and then putting sticks on his fingers for fun.
3. Tortured while crucified.
4. A four-liter bottle of water hanged on his testicles while someone pushed him away.
5. Left in a dark and extremely cold place for days without any of his coats.
6. Tortured while being told he will be treated that way just because he is not Tigray.
7. Forced to Push a wall while being tortured, tormented and told his ethnic group is to weak to push the TPLF.
8. TPLF cadres stripping him of his clothes while telling him he is a disgusting pig because he is not a Tigray.

If any of these horrible crimes were committed against the prime minister, he would probably have admitted the inhumane practices of his government.

Right now, the regime should not only release all political prisoners without preconditions, but it should also face the following: complete and independent investigations on torture in all its prisons, including torture by ethnicity, killings and rape in its prisons, the identity and number of prisoners tortured as well as the number of prisoners killed during torture and the TPLF leadership members who approved such inhumane torture techniques. Furthermore, all torturer, killer cadres, police men and their superiors including top TPLF leadership should be persecuted by an independent court. Note: All investigations should be part of the suggested Maekelawi museum.

In addition, the regime should face independent investigations for the killings of peaceful demonstrators in Addis Ababa, Ambo, Kobel (Abay Mado), Dembi Dolo and other cities, including the killings of more than eight hundred Irreecha celebrators. They should also face such investigations for massacring and inciting violence and intentional displacement of Anuak, Somali, Oromo and Amhara brother and sisters in various regions of the country.

The TPLF is shamelessly trying to persuade Ethiopians that it could convert itself to a democratic government. However, the TPLF is a cruel, extremely corrupt, inhumane and ethnocentric mafia organization that must be removed for Ethiopians to establish a meaningful and sustainable democracy. Thus far, the regime in Addis Ababa has been imprisoning Ethiopians using a terrorism law that is completely designed to suppress descent and Ethiopians know very well the fact that the healing process will never start until terrorist TPLF along with its puppet prime minster who has no shame in telling Ethiopians there is a multi-party system are removed from power. Ethiopians should have a right to elect a government who works for them instead of spying, defecating and urinating on them.

We call upon the United Nations, Amnesty International, Human rights Watch, the US congress, the US senate, European Union and other Champions of Human Rights to demand for an immediate and independent investigation of the Ethiopian Regime for crimes against Humanity.

Human rights are rights inherent to all human beings

NY/NJ Ethiopians Task Force (www.ethionynj.com)

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By: Yared Terfassa

In a recent posting on Satenaw website, Prof. Alemayehu G.  Mariam presented what he dubbed as his “provocative and thoughtful argument and analysis” of ethnic federalism. In his writing (titled “Win-Et: Understanding the Mind of the Mastermind of Ethnic Federalism,” December 25, 2017), the Professor expressed his interest to find collaborative solutions to the country’s ills, and extended a challenge to others to offer competing perspectives, ideas and views on the theory and practice of federalism. In response to such an invitation as well as out of a desire to counter the perennial veiled attack on the Oromo struggle for freedom and recognition, I will attempt to make a modest contribution here.

Federalism is an arrangement of state structure based on the belief that the entire country functions better when the federal (national) government acknowledges the states (nations, sub-groups, etc.) as separate governments, and abstains from interfering in the states’ running of their respective governments. As such, it refers to the complete set of structures at the national, state, and local level and web of complex interrelationships between them. The choice of federalism generally implies a recognition of the fact that the entire country is made of a union of separate constituent parts, i.e., states, or national groups.

Federalism has been the primary choice of state arrangement for countries with large geography and/or diverse demography. Ethiopia, being large and diverse, is thus a suitable candidate for a federal arrangement. Considering the current worrisome political crisis, ethnic conflict, and the possibility of disintegration of the country, a federal arrangement is not only deemed suitable, but it has become indispensable for co-existence.

There have been various attempts at federalizing the Ethiopian state. These attempts have, however, been frustrated to a greater degree by the existence of divergent and competing views about the whole and the parts: the Ethiopian State and the nations within it.

To appreciate these divergent views and the resultant political quagmire, it is important to distinguish between the country of Ethiopia and the Ethiopian State. Country is generally considered of comprising a land, a terrain, a people, a culture, a history, a collective self-understanding, and a network of social institutions and framed and bound together by a distinctive juridical structure of a governing body. The State is an abstraction that basically refers to the administrative core of the country.

State formation is a phenomenon of the 19^th century. Prior to that, countries have existed, in one form or another, without a need for a modern state. For example, the Oromo, like all African peoples of the time, had never had a state in the modern sense, they have always had a country of their own, Biyya Oromo (Oromia). When the idea of the modern state was coming to Africa, the Oromo were for the most part governing their country under the Gadaa system of direct democracy. The formation of the Ethiopian state may have preempted the transition of the Oromo from direct democracy to republicanism.

Since the state is not itself a country, there is nothing sacrosanct about the state. Thus, one may oppose a particular state formation in the name of a country. One may also defend the formation of the state without committing to the importance of the country. And, both phenomena have been unfolding in the Ethiopian political scene for over a century now.

One manifestation of the competing views on the formation of the Ethiopian State involves narratives about the age of the state itself: millennia versus a century. Some political forces claim that the Ethiopian State has existed for three millennia. Such longevity is supposed to make the state beyond reproach or reform. Long existence is thought here as a justification for continued existence, at any cost, and accuse others of sedition. The fallacy in this argument is that one need not see the Ethiopian State to have existed for millennia to see it as worthy.

Others view the Ethiopian state as having existed for only a century. They adopt such perspective with the knowledge about the malleability of the concept of the state, and with a view to challenge the moral dangers associated with the claim of there thousand years of history – chauvinism, supremacy, jingoism, and repression. They have come to believe that Ethiopian nationalism has become a refuge for scoundrels.

Based on these competing views, the goal of state formation has been presented as a binary choice between “UNITY” and “UNION.” Unity denotes the total absorption by or assimilation of the diverse groups into one ethno-linguistic group, regardless of whether these groups desire to maintain their heritage. Union, on the other hand, signifies the formation of a federal structure/model in which diversity is recognized and interaction among the groups is promoted.

The Unity versus the Union goals of state formation are in turn associated with two competing ideologies of state formation: Nationalist and Revolutionary Democracy. The Nationalist conception of the creation of political entities presumes that the state has prior existence, and hence the various cultural or linguistic groups must give way to the state/national culture and language, whereas the central idea of Revolutionary Democracy is that a state is consisted of sovereign, citizen-people.

The Unity/Nationalist group is driven by an instinctual urge to simplify issues and dictate orders. Thus, it just wants to resolve differences of ideas or cultures, or language into sameness. The proponents of this model want “ethnic identities” to give way to “national identities.” They view the desire for ethnic recognition and self-determination as sources of prejudice and war. They want to achieve harmony and peace by moving from ethnic to national, from particular attachments to universal reason.

Indeed, there are moral universals – the sanctity of life, the dignity of the human person, the right to be free, to be no man’s slave or the object of someone’s violence. In this regard, we are all members of the universal human family. Yet, we are also members of a particular human family with its particular history and memory, which confers upon us loyalties and obligations to the members of our community.

The Unity/Nationalis approach suffers from both moral impurity and methodological crudity/cruelty. There is no culture that is morally superior to another one. Thus, the idea of a national culture entails the arbitrary choice of one at the expense of others. The question then becomes, whose ethno-linguistic traits are to be promoted to the national status? Why undermine or kill a living language? Why destroy vibrant, long-standing identity of the Oromo, the Sidama, the Wolayita, the Konso, etc.? The nationalist common response to such concerns has been that “the state comes first; the end justifies the means.”

The other fundamental question regarding the creation of a uniform culture is whether it can be achieved without inflicting shame and pain on others? In countries where the nationalist approach has taken root, dehumanization and brutalization of peoples have been employed. These countries have used totalitarianism, fascism, Nazism, socialism, capitalism, conservatism, etc. to destroy civilizations and peoples with a view to create a new, same, national identity. The fact that native peoples in the Americas and elsewhere have been decimated does not justify the continuation of the inhumane practices of state formation. It is the contention of this writer that there must be a better, peaceful, humane way to enable various peoples to live together without resorting to barbaric means.

Any attempt to impose on different groups an artificial uniformity in the name of a single “national identity” represents a tragic misunderstanding of what it takes to form a new moral order in which the peoples flourish. Because the peoples in Ethiopia are different, each people have something unique to contribute, and every contribution counts. The Ethiopian nationalists’ primordial instinct to see differences as a threat is massively dysfunctional. It is not wise to impose an artificial unity on a divinely created diversity.

The Unity/Nationalist ideology, which has been in full swing for a century, got interrupted when the TPLF came to power in 1991, and declared its adoption of Revolutionary Democracy. Revolutionary Democracy was supposed to be an alternative to the nationalist perspective on state formation.  Under a Revolutionary Democracy state, it was envisioned that the sovereignty of the various groups of people in the country would be recognized. It was propagated that recognition and self-governance would lead to a symbiotic relationship among the peoples under one political entity, Ethiopia.

TPLF’s choice of revolutionary democracy was not purely a technical exercise. Rather, TPLF and Meles had their own assumptions and interests that lead them to describe the Ethiopian problem as a “national question” and prescribe Revolutionary Democracy as a panacea. Such description and prescription has enabled TPLF to stay in power for twenty-five years; although there really are clear signs of its impending demise.

As far as Oromos are concerned, Revolutionary Democracy has slightly mitigated historical dehumanization, but doubled the physical brutalization of the people. It has resulted in the establishment of the supremacy of a minority ethnic group and the dictatorship of one party. The TPLF rule has also produced a political class who publicly pronounce their “love” of Ethiopia and unabashedly despise the peoples in Ethiopia. Consequently, revolutionary democracy has now been rejected by all.

At this juncture, it is worthwhile to say a few words about relationship between the doctrine of ethnic federalism and the principle of self-determination. Self-determination is an empirical expression of human dignity by a group in making a choice of political association and/or structure. Ethnic federalism is one of the many ways of exercising self-determination. Although there is an organic link between ethnic federalism and self-determination, the nexus is not Stalin as Prof. Alemayehu alludes. Long, long before Stalin, the principle of self-determination has been exercised as a matter of course by and in all parts of the world. Self-determination, as a politico-social concept, has existed since the formation of human societies.

The attempt to discredit and denounce peoples struggle by deliberately linking the principle of self-determination and ethnic federalism to Stalinism is intellectually disingenuous and historically wrong. What animates nations, such as the Oromo, to desire and struggle for self-determination is not the writings of Lenin, Trotsky or Stalin on the rights of nations to self-determination. The Oromos do not need the intellectual guidance of Stalin, or anyone else for that matter, when they have the brain caliber of Haile Fida, Lencho Letta, Dima Negewo, Mekuria Bulcha, or Gadaa Maleba, and many others.

Oromos are guided by a belief that the received traditions of Gadaa and Irrecha as well as the Oromo language are worth reclaiming and reproduction, a conviction that they have the inalienable right to exist as a people like everybody else, an inextinguishable desire to defend ourselves against those who wish them ill, the knowledge that diversity is a natural phenomenon, and a hope of living in peace and prosperity as a member of the human family of nations, in union with those around us who share our destiny. The struggle for recognition and democracy are part and parcel of the struggle for self-determination. Such a struggle is not aimed against another group; it is rather waged to create a new moral order.

Finally, Professor Alemayehu declares that he knows “without a doubt, ethnic federalism is the intellectual product of the evil of hate.” It is not clear to this writer whether the Professor is adopting the “evil” description to the victims and the perpetrators of the Ethiopian tragedy at the same time. Is there a moral equivalence between those struggling for dignity and those who perpetrate violence to suppress them? Is ethnic federalism really the product of the evil of hate only? Could ethnic federalism be a product of a civilized mind that rejects violence, subordination and that aspires union, and peaceful co-existence?

Who is evil? Feyisa Lelisa? Hachalu Hundesa? Ali Birra? Lense Lemesa? Seenna Solomon? Elfinesh Quenno? Jambo Jotte? Dawite Mekonnen? Abbas Gnamo? Ezekiel Gabissa?

Who is evil:

Merera Gudina? –  a political science professor who has spent his entire life for peace and equality for all peoples in Ethiopia; a fearless leader who has been in the fore front to challenge TPLF intellectually and politically inside Ethiopia?

Bekele Gerba? – a man of strong moral stance in the tradition of such Oromo leaders as Obbo Magarsa (Abuna Petros) who speak truth to power; who inspired a generation of Oromos to stand up for their dignity; a professor of literature; a staunch advocate of justice and equality?

Tadesse Biru? –  the father of Oromo nationalism who had served the Ethiopian state until it proved unwilling and unable to address the grievances of his people?

Ibsa Gutema? –  that man of iron in his soul who took the brunt of the Ethiopian state’s violence upon himself for the dignity of his nation?

Mohammed Hassen? – most gentle, history professor who has spent a life time correcting the deliberate distortions and falsification of Oromo history in Ethiopia?

Sisay Ibsa? – a selfless man who has spent his life empowering his people at home and abroad; a man who spearheaded the effort to articulate the Oromo question; a man of tremendous intellectual vigor; a proven community organizer, and political leader?

Dawud Ibsa? – the soft-spoken political leader who is the symbol of Oromo defiance in the face of the most brutal Ethiopian regime; a man would let his enemy keep him down even if they had put him in prison, tortured him, or poisoned him because he is Oromo and struggles for the Oromo?

As civilized men, these individuals realize the relative validity of their convictions, yet they stand for them unflinchingly. These individuals and million other Oromos want self-determination for the Oromo people. Millions of Oromos want ethnic federalism in which the ethno-linguistic identities of all peoples are recognized and developed.

Oromo is sacred. Oromoness began thousands of years ago in the hunger for immortality. It is sacred as over 40,000,000 Oromos live it, identify with it, find meaning and purpose in it. It is sacred because generation of Oromos are willing to fight for the revival, survival, and flourishment of their civilization.

The Ethiopian state is based on history, not some political or moral ideal. A century has now passed with debate about the content and age of this history dominating the political conflict in the country. The country has many other urgent challenges with respect to poverty, economic growth, wealth distribution, access to and quality of education, access to and quality of health care, technological development, infrastructure development, competition and security issues, and many more. It is high time that political actors move away from the debate about history and focus on the establishment of a humane, just, and democratic union.

Win-Et: Understanding the Mind of the Mastermind of Ethnic FederalismPosted (Al Mariam)

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Releasing prisoners through pardon and amnesty (on a case-by-case basis) is a normal, if infrequent, juridical process implemented through the exercise of the Executive’s clemency power. It is done as an act of mercy exerted to ‘humanize’ legal justice or ‘to give legal justice a human face’. It is a thin supplement to the judicial work of convicting and correcting the guilty and acquitting and releasing the innocent.

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Hopes and Concerns: What is to be done?

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Addis Fortune

Premier Appoints Deputy to Chair MetEC Board
Demeke Mekonnen, deputy prime minister, has been appointed by the Prime Minister to chair the board of directors of the state owned Metals & Engineering Corporation (MetEC), replacing Minister of Defence, Siraj Fergessa.

Siraj will, however, remain a member of the board, which added Fetleworq G. Egziyabher, recently elected as deputy chair of TPLF. Chief of Staff Samora Yenus (Gen.) sits in the board alongside Ahmed Abitew, minister of Industry.

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Ethiopia Dr Abrham Alemu Dr Derese Getachew Lema Megersa Hopes and Concerns – SBS  Amharic

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BY ALEMAYEHU G. MARIAM, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR — 01/05/18 09:20 AM EST 21

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Teshome M. Borago

After over 2 years of courageous Ethiopian protests and thousands of innocent lives lost, the TPLF ruling party has thrown crumbs and meaningless promise at the Ethiopian people once again. This week, Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn first announced that “political prisoners” will be released. Suddenly, many naive international human rights organizations and leaders praised the regime. But just one day later, his TPLF handlers told him to reverse everything, accusing the media of “misquoting” his announcement. So, Hailemariam now completely rejects that “political prisoners” even exist in Ethiopia; therefore he claims that it is due to his party’s graciousness that “imprisoned or convicted politicians and others” will be pardoned.

When have we witnessed this drama before?

It was of course in 2007 when TPLF put on a masterful show of pardoning prominent opposition officials of the CUD party who were incarcerated right after winning the 2005 national election. That was a historic election where TPLF used its OPDO Oromo cadres to defame and attack the CUD party; just like it is currently using the Somali Liyu Police to attack the Oromo-Amara (#Oromara) alliance. The strategy failed then and CUD mobilized millions to win even populated regions of Oromia and 99% of the city votes. In response, TPLF declared state of emergency in 2005, killed hundreds of protestors and held opposition leaders as hostage. When most Western Powers denounced these barbaric acts, TPLF later freed the prisoners as a diversion tactic to portray an illusion of reform and change. However, after the prisoners release, the human rights situation in Ethiopia actually got worse and the ruling party decided to kick out even the small opposition figures in its parliament, successfully becoming a one-party tyranny like its Derg predecessor.

Will the same tactic work for TPLF again?

Ten years later, the TPLF seems to be using the same tactic to save its sinking ship.

The problem is that Ethiopia is too big and too diverse to be ruled with an iron fist forever. After 2005, even after TPLF destroyed the legal opposition; diverse members of its own coalition had began to crack. Having fed narrow tribal propaganda of Oromo nationalism (OPDO) and Amhara nationalism  (ANDM) for two decades as a tool to undermine cosmopolitan Ethiopian nationalists, the TPLF finally got a taste of its own medicine since 2015. Land and power disputes took ethnic dimensions and sparked regional protests that the ruling party has yet to recover from.

The turning point of these isolated protests was when mostly Amara Gondar protestors (some armed with weapons and too close to TPLF’s hometown) began to strategically coordinate with Oromo protestors who suffocated the commercial routes of the center with their bravery and unflinching determination. Such Oromo-Amara alliance was recently fueled by their desperation to spread or nationalize their isolated movements, as well as inspired by Ethiopian nationalists like Teddy Afro, whose album in 2017 was featured in every major international media and quickly became an anthem for Ethiopians worldwide. Suddenly, even Oromo diaspora activists like Jawar Mohammed began to preach Ethiopian unity and virtually abandon divisive hot topics like tribalization of Addis Ababa and defamation of our patriotic ancestors.  Jawar even defended Teddy Afro against government censorship as the #Oromara alliance grew.

This yearlong unity of Ethiopian protestors has cornered the TPLF ruling party and made several pockets of the nation completely ungovernable. The regime’s divide and rule policy has faltered.

And there is no sign that the new protests will end anytime soon. Unlike the systematic suppression of the urban opposition after the 2005 election, the TPLF will not be able to stop the current rural protests. For example, during the aftermath of that election, Meles Zenawi accelerated his program of the “One-to-five” network of spies around Addis Ababa. Since then, more Tigrayans have also migrated to the urban and many have become informers in every block of the cities, especially Addis Ababa.

Ironically, the same destructive “ethnic-federalism” structure that has made the country ripe for ethnic conflicts is also the same structure that might end up killing TPLF and its spy program. The ongoing protests have now proven that TPLF is unable to keep its important 1-to-5 spy program in the rural without the full support of OPDO and ANDM. Particularly in rural Oromia, once the program collapses, it is nearly impossible to restore this “one-to-five” structure without OPDO, due to language barriers and the shear size of the state. Also, unlike the millions of Amharas and southerners living inside Oromia towns, Tigrayans are almost nonexistent in much of the rural state. Therefore, OPDO or any Oromo opposition movement (if it has courageous leadership) will be more capable of defying the TPLF authority in the coming years. If the TPLF regime thinks it can throw crumbs and easily satisfy the protestors, it will be hugely mistaken.

Therefore, addressing only the symptoms of the tyranny by tackling minor corruption cases and releasing prisoners will not be enough. Ethiopia needs a permenant systematic change by fixing its undemocratic institutions at the judiciary, civil service, federal agencies and particularly the military which lacks independence from the TPLF. So far, the TPLF ruling party seems to be uninterested in genuine reform and it might even attempt to slide back to its brutal military solution.

It is upto the protest movements to force the regime and there are three more methods.

First, the Oromo and Amara protests must somehow take their movement to the center of Addis Ababa and that requires further de-ethnicization of their end goal and rhetoric. Secondly, the “Oromara” protests must be more disciplined and avoid attacking any Tigrayan businesses and civilians. Thirdly, the Oromo and Amara protests must reach out to other ethnic groups, particularly the Somalis, whose Liyu Police gang have become TPLF’s new lifeline. This third step requires not only political leadership among Oromo and Somali diaspora communities but also discipline back home to stop ethnic clashes or revenge killings that have led to massive displacement of civilians along the Oromia-Somali borders.

All these three strategies are vital to put more pressure on TPLF and set up a foundation for a transition to democracy.

Teshomeborago@gmail.com

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While the Gregorian calendar celebrates Christmas on the 25th of December, Ethiopia still retains the ancient Julian calendar in which Christmas falls on January 7th. People in towns and villages typically dress up in their finest to celebrate.

The Ethiopian name given to Christmas is Ledet or Genna which comes from the word Gennana, meaning “imminent” to express the coming of the Lord and the freeing of mankind from sin.

Genna festivities begin early in the day, as early as 6:00am when people gather in churches for mass. For the clergy it has begun much earlier, 43 days before, with the fasting period leading up to Genna. This pensive fasting period is required of the clergy and is known as the fast of the prophets. The fast of Advent is carried out to cleanse the body and soul in preparation for the day of the birth of Christ.

Everyone stands throughout the worship service for up to three hours. The clergy and Debtera (scholars versed in the liturgy and music of the church) lift their voices in hymn and chant just as it has been for over a 1,500 years when Ethiopia accepted Christianity.  This ancient rite culminates in the spectacular procession of the Tabot (the Tabot is symbolic of the Ark of the Covenant) and carried on top of a priest’s head). The procession makes its way three times around the church amidst ululation and chiming church bells, dazzling umbrellas and colorful attire of the clergy and a throng of Christians who follow the procession with lighted candles.

Afterwards, people disperse to their homes to feast and the clergy break their fast.  Food served at Christmas includes Doro Wat and Injera, a spicy chicken stew eaten with the sourdough pancake-like bread. Often, tej, a local wine-like drink made from honey, accompanies the feast.
Christmas is quietly shared and celebrated in groups of friends and family. Gift giving is a very small part of Christmas festivities in Ethiopia. Only small gifts are exchanged amongst family and friends at home. The joy of giving and sharing, extends beyond religious beliefs and spreads the spirit of peace on earth and goodwill to all mankind throughout the world.

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Dr. Segenet Kelemu is the Director General of the International Center of Insect Physiology and Ecology (icipe) Nairobi, Kenya. The Ethiopian native is the fourth Chief Executive Officer, and the first woman to lead icipe. (Image. Time.com)

TIME

This Ethiopian Scientist Is Saving Lives by Studying Insects

Segenet Kelemu has always been a discoverer. As a scientist, she would achieve breakthroughs–“Crack the constraints,” as she puts it–and feel euphoric. But she came to a realization: “So you do research, you publish the paper–and then what?”

Having constructed an international network of biotechnology laboratories in Africa and now serving as director general of the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology–a research facility in Nairobi that solves problems posed by insects to public health–Kelemu ensures that research reaches people.

Thanks to improved seed and farming technology, the ICIPE has been able to control grain pests and improve soil, now reaching at least 20,000 Ethiopian farmers.

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Highlights of interview by Engidu Woldie

Neamin Zeleke, a member of the executive committee and deputy head of political affairs with Patriotic Ginbot 7 gave an in-depth interview to ESAT’s Sisay Agena on the weekly show “yesamintu engida” (Guest of the Week).

Neamin Zeleke shuttles between Washington, DC and Asmara to coordinate the worldwide support by Ethiopians to Patriotic Ginbot 7 in the struggle to free Ethiopia of the TPLF tyranny. The leadership of PG7 has long made Eritrea its base.

The son of a navy commander, Neamin reminiscence on behalf of his dad, Zeleke Bogale, who was credited for being instrumental in modernizing the Red Sea Ports of Asab and Massawa during the imperial era and later as the head of Maritime Transport Authority in the subsequent regime.

Asked about what it feels like to be in Eritrea, as an independent country, where his dad spent his life managing the Ports when Eritrea was part of Ethiopia, Neamin begins by saying life is full of contradictions. He says his dad, despite the damaging war at the time, was focused on the betterment of the lives of the people in and around the Ports.

Despite the fact that Ethiopia had become a landlocked country after Eritrea’s independence, Neamin is confident that once the TPLF, which Eritrea sees as a threat to the peace and security of the region as whole is done away with, there is no limit what relations based on mutual respect and benefit would bring to people on both sides.

“What Ethiopians want from Eritreans is not just simply access to the Ports. It is way beyond that. It is about people to people relationship. It is about creating bonds in economic, security and defense spheres.”

He said successive regimes got it wrong as far as handling the Eritrean question. And hence, he said, why it had seceded from Ethiopia. He went on to say that Eritrea is now the only country that supports the struggle by the Ethiopian people for freedom and democracy.

Ethiopia, Neamin says, is at a crossroads. TPLF is a destructive force that must be removed. It is the responsibility of all Ethiopians to work for the creation of a country where the individual rights of citizens are respected and rule of law prevails.

Neamin Zeleke also speaks about his role in a number of political parties since his youthful times (not that he is old now) and what brought about the political person that he is now.

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By Al Mariam

TPLF: Does the LF stand for Lie Factory? Is it Meles or Melies?

The “LF” in TPLF stands for Lie Factory. Melies Zenawi was the chief executive officer of the TP Lie Factory.

With last week’s announcement of  the so-called “release of political prisoners” by the T-TPLF, I am absolutely convinced the TPLF is a factory for lies, damned lies and statislies (statistical lies).

For a decade and half, the Thugtatorship of the Tigrean People’s Liberation Front (T-TPLF) regime boldfacedly claimed it holds no political prisoners in Ethiopia.

The late thugmaster Melies in 2006 boldly declared “There are no political prisoners in Ethiopia.” He repeated his barefaced lie claiming, “Nobody has been imprisoned for criticising the government. No one”, except, of course, criminals bent on “overthrowing the duly constituted government by unconstitutional means” and “pushing the country towards chaos”.

Meles’ minion-cum-successor Hailemariam Desalegn in 2012 blathered to Al Jazeera (forward clip to 7:53), “There are no political opposition that are languishing in prison.” His flunky-cum-spokesman Getachew Reda in 2013 repeated the fiction matter-of-factly asserting, “We don’t have any single political prisoner in the country.”

In his January 3 announcement, the T-TPLF puppet prime minster (PPM) Hailemariam also promised to shut down the infamous torture chamber known as “Maekelawi Prison”, which also did not exist like the political prisoners, and reopen it as a “museum”.

What a fantastic idea! Maekelawi should be aptly named, “The Museum of T-TPLF Horrors, Hate and Hubris”.

Lo and behold, in January 2018, political prisoners that never existed suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Were they hidden in the underground dungeons of Maekelawi?

The fact of the matter is, as the T-TPLF has claimed, there are no political prisoners in Ethiopia.

There is only ONE political prisoner. Her name is ETHIOPIA.

The T-TPLF has been raping, mutilating, torturing, robbing, mugging, pillaging, abusing and ransacking ETHIOPIA for the past 27 years.

Release, better yet, liberate ETHIOPIA from the iron shackles of the T-TPLF and there will be no more talk of political prisoners.

T-TPLF disinformation campaign on political prisoners

Of course, the T-TPLF is playing political football with political prisoners. They think they can get good public relations mileage out of it. Indeed, they did, if only momentarily.  Accolades and commendations for the announcement came from the African Union, members of the U.S. Congress and various human rights organizations.

But few believed the words of the T-TPLF con men. They all demanded immediate action and prompt release of all political prisoners. Then within 24 hours, the t-TPLF began backpedaling and talking about “misquotes and mistranslations”.

Everyone knows there are tens of thousands of political prisoners in Ethiopia. Only the T-TPLF knows exactly how many political prisoners (that have not existed until a few days ago) are held in its official and secret prisons. But the T-TPLF says it cannot provide an accurate number because there are no political prisoners. In the T-TPLF’s circular logic, there are political prisoners but they did not exist until last week, ans may well not exist next week. Now you see them, now you don’t!

The political prisoners include not only well-known opposition figures, journalists, dissidents such as journalist Eskinder Nega and Woubshet Taye, Prof. Bekele Gerba, Dr. Merra Gudina, opposition leader Andualem Aragie, human rights activists Ahmedin Jebel, Nigist Yirga, Emawayish Alemu, Abubakar Ahmed, Okello Akway Ochalla, Col. Demeke Zewdu and so many others, but also ordinary citizens jailed on mere suspicion of opposition to the T-TPLF. The vast majority of T-TPLF political prisoners come from the Oromo, Amhara, Southern Nations and Nationalities Peoples regions.

The T-TPLF jails anyone arbitrarily and without any legally competent proof.

For instance, on October 15, 2016, the T-TPLF issued its “State of Emergency Command Post” Decree imposing sweeping prohibitions against “incitement and communication that causes public disturbance and riots, communicating with terrorist groups, unauthorized demonstration and public gatherings, conducting strikes in educational institutions and sports facilities, obstructing vehicles’ movement, disturbing and causing incitement in religious, cultural, and public holidays and acts against tolerance and unity”, among others. Among the “measures to be taken” to enforce the Decree included, “detention without an arrest warrant”, keeping detainees incommunicado, “warrantless searches and seizures and arrests”, among others.

Consequently, in October 2016, following the Irreecha Massacres and declaration of state of emergency, the T-TPLF admitted imprisoning over 11,000 individuals within a few days.

Following the 2005 election, the T-TPLF arrested over 30,000 persons.

Some “experts” estimate there are about 1,000 persons held under the T-TPLF’s   anti-terrorism law with another 5,000 cases still pending in T-TPLF monkey courts.

The key question is how one defines a political prisoner or prisoner of conscience? Unfortunately, there is no universal or widely accepted standard definition of “political prisoner”.

That has made it easier for the T-TPLF to play semantic and word games for years in denying the existence of political prisoners. They say they have jailed only “terrorists”, opposition leaders conspiring “to overthrow the constitutional order”, “mercenaries supported by Ethiopia’s enemies”, “anti-peace elements”, “corruption suspects” and sundry other “criminals”. They have even jailed their own members on dubious corruption charges to neutralize them to consolidate the power of the dominant group within the T-TPLF.

For lack of a better standard, I use as a guide the standard set forth by the Council of Europe (CoE) in determining whether a person is a political prisoner. That standard relates to a person’s imprisonment by state authorities for exercising the freedom of thought, conscience, and religion; freedom of expression and information; and freedom of assembly and association.

Under the CoE protocol, a person may be considered a political prisoner if one or more of the following conditions are true: The detention is imposed for purely political reasons. The length or conditions of detention are out of proportion to the offense. The detainee is detained in a discriminatory manner as compared to other persons. The detention is the result of judicial proceedings that are clearly unfair and connected with the political motives of authorities.

My personal estimate of the number of political prisoners held by the T-TPLF, based on the CoE criteria and disparate data culled from publicly available records and other materials with substantial credibility, is approximately 100,000.

There is a partial list of political prisoners to start with if the T-TPLF is serious about releasing political prisoners.

T-TPLF bait and switch

Bait and switch is a common marketing tactic used by dishonest merchants who advertise what appears to be a great offer then switch the offer around when the customer comes to make the purchase. They will often use the excuse that the offer was “just a promotion”, the advertised item was “inadvertently mislabeled” or outright blame the customer for “misunderstanding” the advertised offer.

Bait and switch is precisely what the T-TPLF did with it offer of “releasing political prisoners”. They intentionally, deliberately and calculatedly made an announcement of political prisoners knowing that it will be understood by the public as “all political prisoners” and then backtracked on it after they have obtained the public relations mileage out of it.

Conveniently, after the day’s news cycle has ended and all the accolades and commendations from the African Union, members of the U.S. Congress and human rights organizations have come in, PPM Hailemariam’s aide stated that “only some imprisoned politicians will be pardoned” and that a “mistranslation” led to Hailemariam “being quoted as saying that all political prisoners would be freed to promote dialogue.”

What a crock of _ _ _ t!

Who “misquoted” or “mistranslated” the T-TPLF PPM’s statement?

What is the exact statement that was “misquoted” or “mistranslated?

For such a monumental announcement, why was there not a clear official written statement made public in Amharic or English or both languages?

Of course, there was no “misquoting” and “mistranslation”. It’s the old bait and switch trick. The T-TPLF is being slick and sly. It is how the T-TPLF mind thinks. It never ceases to amaze me how the T-TPLF thugs believe they are so smart and clever that they can outfox, outwit, outthink, outsmart, outplay and outmaneuver anyone, any day of the week. They really believe they can fool the donors and loaners and the Ethiopian people by making a half-assed announcement about political prisoners. Not a chance!

The fact of the matter is that the whole political prisoners’ announcement is a repeat of the old T-TPLF political theater, three-ring political circus, except this time nonexistent political prisoners are on the stage.

It is the old and tired T-TPLF game of mass distraction by mass disinformation.

It is a desperate game played by delusionally isolated men trapped in a siege mentality.

All of the talk about “political prisoners”, “closing Maekelawi torture chamber” and “opening the political space” is intended to distract Ethiopians and the donors and loaners from focusing on the tornadic winds of change blowing over Ethiopia.

The fact of the matter is that the T-TPLF “beast is wounded”, very badly.

Like any wild beast, it has only one choice: expire quietly or react impulsively and take with itself to the trash bin of history as many as it can.

All of the T-TPLF gobbledygook about political prisoners, political space and the rest is just pretentious talk (B.S.) which betrays their deep anxieties and profound political angst about loss of control and power as a result of the popular uprising driven by the youth.

In my February 2016 commentary, “Ethiopia Under the Boots of the T-TPLF Beast With Feet of Clay”, I argued the T-TPLF is a Beast with feet of clay. When gazed upon, the T-TPLF appears awesome, formidable and infinitely powerful. It has guns, tanks, rockets, planes and bombs. Though the T-TPLF has legs of iron, its feet are made of clay. I predicted the T-TPLF Beast will be defeated by Ethiopia’s young people.

For over a decade, I have written dozens of commentaries about the T-TPLF’s smoke and mirrors, now you see it, now you don’t game with political prisoners.

In my August 2009 commentary, “Remembering Ethiopian Political Prisoners”, I laid out a strategy to engage in grassroots mobilization for the release of political prisoners in Ethiopia. I believe those strategies are still valid today.

The T-TPLF disinformation machine in Orwellian-style uses “political language to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”

PPM Hailemariam’s talk about political prisoners and the rest of it is nothing but damned lies and his promise of release of political prisoners is pure wind.

The “misquoting”, “mistranslation” backpedaling on release of political prisoners is Orwellian newspeak, doublespeak, blackwhite”-speak.

The T-TPLF bosses will say and believe “black is white, in contradiction of the plain facts and forget that one has ever believed the contrary.” They will say, “political prisoners will be released”. Then add, “only some political prisoners”. They will keep on adding: “Those we think are political prisoners. Only after we have developed procedures for release according to the constitution. Only after the prisoners ask for pardon. Only after the parliament passes a law. Only after…. BS….”. The T-TPLF bosses are experts at con jobs, equivocating, evasion, dodging, stonewalling, and pussyfooting around the truth.

I coined a new word to describe the political crapola manufactured in the TP Lie Factory, “liestruth” (lie is truth).

The word describes the T-TPLF habit of impudently claiming lies are truth in contradiction of the plain facts. Liestruth ignores inconvenient truths. Thus, dictatorship is democracy. War is peace. Corruption is integrity. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. State terrorism is rule of law. State of emergency is state of peace.

In liestruth, political prisoners do not exist, but if they do, now you see them, now you don’t.

The T-TPLF has undertaken numerous disinformation campaigns.  I have tried to keep up with their liestruth and speak truth to their faces on a weekly basis, without interruption, since 2006.

In my September 5, 2016 commentary, The Lies and Disinformation Campaigns of the T-TPLF, I exposed the disinformation techniques used by the T-TPLF to destroy what they claimed to be an “Amhara-Oromo alliance” against them.

In my September 18, 2016 commentary, “The Truth About T-TPLF  Genocide Lies and Disinformation in Ethiopia”, I exposed the T-TPLF disinformation campaign to discredit the massive popular uprising in the country and re-write the true story of valor and courage by the Ethiopian people with systematic lies and deception.

In my September 25, 2016 commentary, “Disinformation in T-TPLF Land of Living Lies: Pinocchio Preaches Truth Against Perception in Ethiopia?” I exposed the crocodilian T-TPLF Reich Minister for Disinformation & Propaganda Debretsion Gebremichael’s weapons of mass distraction.

In my March 2017 commentary “The Lords of Living Lies in Ethiopia”, I unpacked the packs of lies manufactured in the TP Lie Factory.

In January 2018, I am unpacking the damned lies of the T-TPLF about political prisoners.

In my commentary in The Hill a couple of days ago, I posed several questions to unpack the T-TPLF’s damnable pack of lies, which I will answer here (in addition to other questions) :

1) Is the announcement on release of political prisoners a public relations stunt by the T-TPLF?

There is no question the announcement is a political stunt. It has two objectives. First, it aims to distract the Ethiopian people by pretending to take historic action while actually playing mind games. Second, it is aimed at buying international good will and trick the donors and loaners into giving the T-TPLF more aid and support given the apparent fact they are “making real changes”.

What is downright disgusting is the fact that the T-TPLF bosses think they can play with the heartstrings of political prisoners and their families by talking about a release, raising their hopes only to crush it in less than 24 hours.  Such depravity, cruelty and wickedness are in the DNA of all the T-TPLF bosses. They are sadistic people. They enjoy seeing innocent people suffer. They are psychopaths.

As I noted in my 2009 commentary “Torture Inc.”, the T-TPLF bosses are simply sadistic thugs who derive great pleasure from the pain and suffering they inflict on others. Psychologists explain that sadistic persons suffer from an inferiority complex and resort to sadism as a defense mechanism. They pretend to be and act superior but deep down they feel inferior. By inflicting pain and suffering on others they seek to fill the void of inferiority they feel inside. They pretend and act like they are playing in the big leagues, but deep down they know they are bush league material (literally).

But they did not fool anyone with their release of political prisoner hogwash. It is a phony, deceitful and devious. The T-TPLF did not pull the wool over our eyes. Not this time.

2) Will there be a blanket amnesty, or only selective release?

The T-TPLF calculatedly made its statement to be ambiguous so that it can play word games later, as it did within 24 hours of the announcement.

The fact of the matter is that either all political prisoners will be released, or none will be released. By announcing release of political prisoners, the T-TPLF has made a legal admission that it holds political prisoners, that is people who are imprisoned arbitrarily for exercising their rights to free speech and press, religious or political beliefs, association and assembly.

PPM Hailemariam said the release of political prisoners will be “according to the constitution and the law”. I agree wholeheartedly.

Let every individual in T-TPLF prison claiming to be a political prisoner challenge his/her condition of detention in a real court, not monkey court, according to Art. 19 and 21 of the T-TPLF constitution and under the Article 177 (1) of the Civil Procedure Code which provides for “an application for habeas corpus may be made to the High Court by any person restrained otherwise than in pursuance of an order duly made under this Code or the Criminal Procedure Code.”

Is the constitution PPM Hailemariam brags about worth the paper it is written on?

3) Is the regime trying to buy time to prolong its rule by making empty promises about the release of political prisoners?

The T-TPLF bosses will say and promise anything to cling to power for as long as possible. They believe they can win the hearts and minds of the Ethiopian people by feeding them empty words and promises. For nearly a decade and half, they have been promising to negotiate with the opposition only to handpick their own minions and call them “opposition leaders”. They have been promising to “open the political space”, only to nail it shut. They have been promising to institute the rule of law only to issue a state of emergency decree jailing tens of thousands of innocent citizens.

When it comes to promises, the T-TPLF always declares amnesia. Did we say we will release all political prisoners? Nah! That was lost in (mis)translation.

During the first ten days of the Ethiopian new year this past September, the T-TPLF tried to play a ridiculous ten-day propaganda charm offensive to endear itself to the Ethiopian people after 26 years of ironhanded tyrannical rule. The T-TPLF scammers pled with Ethiopians, “Kumbaya, let’s all kiss and make up. Let’s shake hands and make peace.”

Now, they have a new scam, release of political prisoners. They will release them and we can all get along like before, with business as usual and ethnic apartheid in place, alive and well.

4) Will the regime create bureaucratic snafus and drag its feet in releasing political prisoners?

The fact of the matter is that the T-TPLF will release no political prisoners. Eskinder Nega, Bekele Gerba, Merra Gudina, Temesgen Desalegn, Woubshet Taye, Andualem Aragie, Nigist Yirga, Emawayish Alemu, Col. Demeke Zewdu and the other high profile political prisoners will certainly not be released.

My prediction is that the T-TPLF, best case scenario, will create a bogus process for the release of political prisoners and drag it on for as long as it can. By creating the bogus process, the T-TPLF bosses believe they can hoodwink and bamboozle the donors and loaners and try to convince them they are making progress and genuine changes.

I shall predict that the T-TPLF will play a game of manana, (eshi nege), tomorrow if it ever starts a process to release political prisoners?

The bottom line is that the T-TPLF will try to play political football with political prisoners domestically and internationally for as long as it can.

There is one game the T-TPLF bosses should be aware of acutely. Game over for the T-TPLF!

5) Could the regime use political prisoners as “hostages” to extract concessions from the opposition?

When the T-TPLF jailed the Kinijit leaders in 2007, they tried to use them as hostages to extract concessions from the opposition parties and generate more support from the donors and loaners. There is no doubt the T-TPLF will use political prisoners as hostages in any negotiations with the opposition or the loaners and donors. They have a history of doing just that.

6) Could the announcement be a genuine gesture aimed at reconciliation and pull the country back from the precipice of civil war?

Is the goodhearted gesture of the fox to protect and make peace with the chickens in the henhouse genuine?

The T-TPLF over the past 27 years have cornered themselves and now look at their own graveyard in ethnic federalism.

Reconciliation comes only after the T-TPLF does three things: 1) Apologize for their crimes over the past 27 years. 2) Publicly accept they are at fault. 3) Propose specific measure to make their wrongs right.

But the other side of reconciliation is truth.

As Desmond Tutu put it, “True reconciliation is never cheap, for it is based on forgiveness which is costly. Forgiveness in turn depends on repentance, which has to be based on an acknowledgement of what was done wrong, and therefore on the disclosure of the truth. You cannot forgive what you do not know.”

There can be no reconciliation without the truth of T-TPLF crimes exposed to the Ethiopian people and before the court of world public opinion.

The T-TPLF can never handle the truth, therefore, it is impossible to have reconciliation with them!

7) Is the political prisoner announcement too little, too late as the country slowly slips into a creeping civil war?

No words or half-assed action by the T-TPLF will stop the creeping civil war.

As I noted in my December 17, 2017 commentary, “The U.S. on the Horns of a Creeping Civil War Dilemma in Ethiopia”, the country today is at a tipping point where civil disobedience is slowly mutating into civil war. Uprisings, protests, demonstrations, open rebellions and defiant challenges to T-TPLF rule are visible in every part of the country. The people are angry, frustrated, outraged, resentful and defiant against T-TPLF rule.

There is only one outcome when the rage and defiance passes the tipping point.

8) Is the promised “pardon” to political prisoners today the same as the pardon offered to Birtukan Midekssa and the Kinijit leaders in 2007?

We have seen the T-TPLF pardon game before with the Kinijit leaders and Birtukan Midekssa on two occasions. The T-TPLF will send elders and what have you to the prisoners to tell them to acknowledge guilt and ask for a pardon in exchange for release. If the prisoners file a petition for pardon acknowledging guilt, they would have, ipso facto, legally accepted responsibility for crimes they did not commit and shamed themselves before the public. By using the pardon process, the T-TPLF accomplishes two things:. First, the T-TPLF aims to establish the ground for future claims that the prisoners were properly convicted of the bogus crimes and the pardon is factual admission and legal proof of guilt  despite their claims at trial they were innocent, or even after they are released. That’s precisely what the T-TPLF did with Birtukan Midekssa when they jailed her for the second time in 2009 for “denying receiving pardon”. Second, the T-TPLF aims to completely discredit and neutralize the prisoners as political or opposition leaders.

The T-TPLF can take their pardon and shove it.

9) Is it possible to trust the words of the T-TPLF?

I do not trust the words of a regime that bold-facedly claimed for over a decade that there are no political prisoners in the country, and shamelessly declared it had won all the seats in parliamentary elections.

I do not trust the words of pathological and sadistic liars!

This is what I have say to the T-TPLF, “Talk is cheap. Action is very expensive. Put the political prisoners where your mouth is. Show me the political prisoners that you said do not exist and then we can talk your cheap talk.”

T-TPLF: Stop playing political football with your political prisoners!

Professor Alemayehu G. Mariam teaches political science at California State University, San Bernardino. His teaching areas include American constitutional law, civil rights law, judicial process, American and California state governments, and African politics. He has published two volumes on American constitutional law, including American Constitutional Law: Structures and Process (1994) and American Constitutional Law: Civil Liberties and Civil Rights (1998). He is the Senior Editor of the International Journal of Ethiopian Studies, a leading scholarly journal on Ethiopia. For the last several years, Prof. Mariam has written weekly web commentaries on Ethiopian human rights and African issues that are widely read online. He blogged on the Huffington post at  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alemayehu-g-mariam/ and later on open.salon until that blogsite shut down in March 2015.

Prof. Mariam played a central advocacy role in the passage of H.R. 2003 (Ethiopia Democracy and Accountability Act of 2007)  in the U.S. House of Representatives in 2007. Prof. Mariam also practices in the areas of criminal defense and civil litigation. In 1998, he argued a major case in the California Supreme Court involving the right against self-incrimination in People v. Peevy, 17 Cal. 4th 1184, cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1042 (1998)  which helped clarify longstanding Miranda rights issues in California criminal procedure. For several years, Prof. Mariam had a weekly public channel public affairs television show in Southern California called “In the Public Interest”. Prof. Mariam received his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1984, and his J.D. from the University of Maryland in 1988.

The post T-TPLF Playing Political Football with Political Prisoners in Ethiopia appeared first on Satenaw: Ethiopian News|Breaking News: Your right to know!.

Egypt’s concern about Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam stems from its entire dependence on the Nile’s water

The post Will the Nile bring Egypt to the brink of another political crisis, this time with Sudan? appeared first on Satenaw: Ethiopian News|Breaking News: Your right to know!.

Real reform unlikely as it would mean self-destruction for government, critics say

John Aglionby, East Africa Correspondent

Time

After anti-government protests erupted two years ago, Ethiopia’s government adopted its traditional approach to dealing with dissent: hundreds of people were killed in clashes with security forces, tens of thousands were detained and a state of emergency was imposed.

But the unrest continued to fester and has escalated in the five months since emergency rule was lifted, once more threatening the stability of the nation and the prospects of one of Africa’s best-performing economies

Now the rattled government is trying a different tactic — making conciliatory gestures to those who oppose its autocratic rule.

Hailemariam Desalegn, the prime minister, announced last week that the government would release political prisoners and close a notorious prison as the first steps in a process to “foster national reconciliation”.

Analysts say the highly unusual measure was prompted by a belated realisation in the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front that the unrest posed a serious threat to its 26-year hold on power. But the way the crisis has been handled also exposes unprecedented cracks in the unity of the four-party ruling coalition.

“The EPRDF has always had divisions but it’s been very insular and everything has been contained,” says Ahmed Salim, an analyst at Teneo Intelligence. “For the first time we’re seeing some of these machinations play out publicly because of the anti-government protests.”

The decision to release prisoners, which has yet to be implemented, was taken by the EPRDF’s 36-member executive committee at a 17-day retreat last month.

In a rare bout of self-criticism, the executive committee blamed the crisis on poor leadership at all levels of the coalition and a lack of democracy.

The EPRDF controls all the seats in parliament and all the main opposition parties have been outlawed or emasculated, the country has few independent civil society organisations and the media is muzzled.

The “conflicts” erupted in 2015 over opposition to government plans to expand the capital, Addis Ababa. They escalated into a more general anti-government movement as discontent rose, particularly in the Oromia and Amhara regions, where people complain about decades of marginalisation by the ruling Tigrayan elite.
The committee concluded that while “on the one hand . . . the situation of our country is delightful”, according to an official translation of a press release, “the conflicts being ensued in different parts of the country . . . posed serious danger to our national survival”.

More recently, the protests have centred on clashes between people in Oromia and the Somali federal state, prompting fears among analysts that the unrest could become increasingly ethnic. “It’s a realisation by the [EPRDF], perhaps a little too late, that they need to shift course in their approach to the growing anti-government sentiment,” Mr Salim says. “It’s a tacit acceptance they’ve got it all wrong.” After its meeting, the EPRDF committee expressed “its earnest remorse for putting the ongoing quarter century [of] development in jeopardy”. Over the past decade, Ethiopia, an impoverished nation of 100m, has recorded average economic growth of more than 8 per cent, while attracting billions of dollars in foreign investment as it positioned itself as a centre of low-cost manufacturing. Awol Allo, an Ethiopian political analyst at Keele University in the UK, describes the prisoner announcement as a “major step in the right direction for the EPRDF”. However, activists’ long-held scepticism of the regime’s reform promises would remain until there was tangible progress, he says. Arguably the greater threat to the coalition’s survival comes not from the streets but from within its ranks, he says, particularly the Oromo Peoples’ Democratic Organisation and Amhara National Democratic Movement parties. “These parties are becoming increasingly vocal and demanding greater democracy,” he says.

The Oromo and Amhara ethnic groups account for more than 60 per cent of the population, but the EPRDF is dominated by the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front. Tigrayans comprise only 6 per cent of the population but the TPLF led the armed struggle that in 1991 toppled Mengistu Haile Mariam’s dictatorship.  The fourth party in the EPRDF is the Southern Ethiopian People’s Democratic Movement, which is led by Mr Hailemariam, the prime minister Mr Salim says the EPRDF is “clearly not united” but that it is premature to predict what will happen. “Complete collapse is the most unlikely scenario but they’re experiencing threats that are existential,” he says.

The coalition’s challenge is to find a balance between survival and satisfying demands for change, says Befeqadu Hailu, a prominent Ethiopian blogger. “If the EPRDF does real reform and introduces proper democracy it will perish, because it’s created so many grievances in every citizen’s head it will either split or be voted out,” he says. “But if it doesn’t do reform, the crisis will get worse.”

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A MID-EAST JOURNAL

The three nations are locked in a dispute about the vast dam being constructed across the Blue Nile in Ethiopia, the source of 85% of Egypt’s water.  

            That Egypt’s economic well-being is dependent on the Nile has been a geopolitical fact of life since ancient times.  Fly over the country, and Egypt’s dependence on the river is starkly illustrated.  Amid vast deserts, the river and its cultivated banks appear as a narrow green ribbon snaking its way to the north, where it widens into a delta before reaching the Mediterranean. The vast majority of Egypt’s 94 million people live adjacent to this fertile belt, along which its main cities from Aswan to Cairo to Alexandria cluster.  The lower Nile valley and the delta together comprise about 3.5 percent of Egypt’s total area.  The remaining 96.5 percent is mostly desert.
The Nile that enters Egypt is fed from two sources.  The White Nile, flowing through Sudan, supplies Egypt with 15 percent of its water; the Blue Nile, emanating from Ethiopia, provides 85 percent.
During the colonial era the fact that one of the the Nile’s main tributaries rises in Lake Victoria, which lies in Tanzania and Uganda, and runs through what are now eleven African countries before discharging into the Mediterranean, held little significance.  Scant consideration was given by colonial rulers to the needs or the rights of the African hinterland. Given the priorities of the time, it is scarcely surprising that a 1929 treaty with Britain provided Egypt with a virtual monopoly over the Nile waters with veto rights over all upstream projects. In 1959, under the provisions of this treaty, Egypt signed a deal with Sudan which guaranteed the two countries use of 90 percent of the Nile waters.
But the world was changing fast. The eight other nations that shared the Nile basin at that time viewed Egypt’s historic dominance of the Nile as increasingly untenable.  Egypt’s upstream neighbours were all undergoing rapid socio-economic development, and these emerging regional powers began to challenge Egypt’s control of what each regarded as its river.
The affected countries eventually got together, and in the 1999 Nile Basin Initiative put forward a proposal to “achieve sustainable socio-economic development through the equitable utilization of, and benefit from, the common Nile basin water resources.”
Ten years of negotiations followed.  Finally in 2010, six Nile Basin countries signed the Cooperative Framework Agreement (CFA):  Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda and Burundi.  They were joined in June 2012 by the newly-created South Sudan.  The CFA was meant to replace the 1929 colonial agreement that gave Egypt absolute rights over all the waters of the Nile, and provide a mechanism for cooperation among all ten member countries in managing the Nile basin water resources. However Egypt and Sudan rejected its reallocation of Nile water quotas under the 1959 agreement, and Congo also refused to sign.
This was the moment a further major complication entered the already complex Nile situation.
Back in the late 1950s, the US Bureau of Reclamation had undertaken a survey of the Blue Nile to identify where a dam might be sited to generate hydro-electricity for the region.  Forty years later, in 2009, the Ethiopian government suddenly decided that the time was ripe to press ahead with the project.  The driving force was former prime minister Meles Zenawi, who had run the country for more than two decades and was obsessed with Ethiopia’s rebirth.
By November 2010 a design for the dam had been drawn up.  On 30 March 2011 the project was made public.  Two days later, on 2 April, Zenawi laid the dam’s foundation stone.  The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (or GERD), will be the largest hydroelectric power plant in Africa.  Almost incredibly, once constructed the reservoir is estimated to take from 5 to 15 years to fill with water.
In August 2017, as construction on the dam reached 60 percent completion, tensions between Egypt and Ethiopia began to rise.  Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said the Nile was “a matter of life and death” for his country and that “no one can touch Egypt’s share of the water”. He demanded that Ethiopia cease construction on the dam as a precondition to negotiations.  Ethiopia retorted that the dam was a matter of life and death for it, too, since it was a vital component in its plans for economic development.
In an attempt to resolve differences, discussions were arranged between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia to consider how best to manage the impact of GERD.  In November 2017 the talks broke down. On December 26, Sameh Shoukry, the Egyptian foreign minister, flew to Addis Ababa to emphasise Egypt’s concerns.
At the heart of the dispute lies Egypt’s fear that, once the dam is built, and especially during the initial phase when the reservoir is being filled, the country will receive less than the annual 55.5 billion cubic metres of water it says is the minimum it needs.  With a surging population that President Sisi has termed “a threat to national development”, Egypt will be requiring more, not less, fresh water over the next decade.
Although most of Egypt’s water comes from the Blue Nile, on which the dam is being built, Ethiopia is adamant that, once the reservoir has been filled, GERD will not adversely affect downstream countries. At the same time it refuses to acknowledge Cairo’s right to 55.5 billion cubic metres of water every year, since this emanates from the 1959 agreement between Egypt and Sudan to which Ethiopia was not a signatory.
Ethiopia is due to start testing the first two turbines shortly, with construction of the dam due for completion by the end of the year. But Egypt. Sudan and Ethiopia have yet to overcome their mistrust of each other and agree mechanisms to contain the impact on downstream countries, both during the filling period and once the dam comes into operation. They need to start co-operating soon.

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ReliefWeb

Situation

• Due to the lingering effects of the 2015-2016 El Niño-induced drought and multiple consecutive droughts, an estimated 8.5 million people in Ethiopia require emergency food assistance, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). An additional 4 million chronically food-insecure people, who are supported by the Government of Ethiopia-led Productive Safety Net Program (PSNP), also require humanitarian assistance.
• Large areas of southeastern Ethiopia will continue to face Emergency (IPC 4) acute food insecurity through mid-2018, with some worst-affected households, particularly displaced pastoralists, at risk of moving into Catastrophe (IPC 5), according to the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET).* Severe drought has decimated livestock herds, sharply reduced crop production and led to widespread disease outbreaks. Large-scale, sustained food assistance in Somali Region is needed to mitigate very high levels of acute malnutrition and the threat of loss of life.
• The drought in Somalia and conflict in Sudan, Somalia, South Sudan and Eritrea have resulted in an influx of refugees into Ethiopia, which hosts approximately 894,000 refugees in total. Approximately 106,000 new refugees have arrived in Ethiopia in 2017. Most of these refugees are from South Sudan, bringing the total of South Sudanese refugees in Ethiopia to 420,000.
• The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) is a standardized tool that aims to classify the severity and magnitude of food insecurity. The IPC scale, which is comparable across countries, ranges from Minimal (IPC 1) to Famine (IPC 5). A Famine classification applies to a wider geographical location, while the term Catastrophe (IPC 5) refers to an extreme lack of food at the household level even with full employment of coping strategies. Famine is determined when more than 20 percent of households in an area are classified as experiencing Catastrophe, when the global acute malnutrition level exceeds 30 percent and when the crude mortality rate exceeds two people per 10,000 persons per day.

Response

• In partnership with Catholic Relief Services (CRS), Food for the Hungry (FH), Relief Society of Tigray (REST) and World Vision (WV), the USAID Office of Food for Peace (FFP) targets food-insecure Ethiopians with long-term development interventions through the PSNP to reduce chronic food insecurity. PSNP is also the first line of response in targeted areas during any food security crisis. With an annual contribution to the PSNP of approximately $125 million, FFP addresses the basic food needs of approximately 1.56 million chronically food-insecure people through the regular seasonal transfer of food and cash resources, while supporting the creation of assets that generate economic benefit to the communities as a whole.
• FFP partners with the UN World Food Program (WFP) and CRS to provide relief food assistance that saves lives and reduces human suffering of those affected by climatic and other shocks, as well as contributes to meeting the basic energy requirements of refugees. In addition, FFP provides specialized nutrition commodities for the treatment of acute malnutrition to WFP, UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the USAID Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance’s health and nutrition partners. In Fiscal Year 2017, FFP also provided resources to WFP for local and regional procurement of cereals, pulses and specialized nutrition commodities.

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